My HD was working fine when it suddenly decided to freeze and repeatedly make a clicking noise. It freezes for a minute then the clicking noise stops. Either it unfreezes or it shows that blue screen saying that it has stopped to prevent windows from getting damaged. If i turn off the comp then turn it back on usually windows boots up and I get 3 minutes of use before it shuts off again. When I turn it on freshly (In the morning when it hasn't been used over night) I get about 30 minutes of use before it freezes up on me. This makes me think it may be something to do with its heat, but I'm not really sure. It is a 200Gb Drive. I have reformatted it and installed windows and everything else freshly but this made no difference. I have done a Hard Drive scan but it said that I had no problems... I cant remember what program I used so it may not have been very good. Could you suggest any programs that could test for bad sectors or if the hard drive is dying. Is there any way to use only certain parts of the drive and skip the damaged parts if it is only parts that are damaged. Is there a program that could do this for me?
Thanks for your help,
Nathan

Could you suggest any programs that could test for bad sectors or if the hard drive is dying. Is there any way to use only certain parts of the drive and skip the damaged parts if it is only parts that are damaged. Is there a program that could do this for me?

I'm a little late to the party but, IMHO, you drive is circling the drain. Get your data off and replace it.

Clicking is usually when the heads have "lost lock" and the drive's trying to recalibrate itself. Maxstor's maxblast would diagnose any vendor's drives but it seems to have been a victim of Seagate's takeover. No idea if Seatools works on other mfgr's drives.

I'm a little late to the party but, IMHO, you drive is circling the drain. Get your data off and replace it.

Clicking is usually when the heads have "lost lock" and the drive's trying to recalibrate itself. Maxstor's maxblast would diagnose any vendor's drives but it seems to have been a victim of Seagate's takeover. No idea if Seatools works on other mfgr's drives.

Actually most failing HDDs click because of head crashes. This is when the heads end up hitting the disk platter. Which cause a spay of disk matter, that inturn causes more head crashes. This is the worst possible thing that can happen to a hard disk drive.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mkemp

I'm a little late to the party but, IMHO, you drive is circling the drain. Get your data off and replace it.

Clicking is usually when the heads have "lost lock" and the drive's trying to recalibrate itself. Maxstor's maxblast would diagnose any vendor's drives but it seems to have been a victim of Seagate's takeover. No idea if Seatools works on other mfgr's drives.